Live exports ‘unlawful’, animal rights groups warn Minister

March 4th, 2020

European and Irish animal welfare groups have called on the Minister for Agriculture to halt the approval of live exports of young calves that they say are in breach of EU law.

In a joint letter sent
to Michael Creed on Monday, Compassion in World Farming (CIWF), Ethical Farming
Ireland and Eyes on Animals argue that the export of export of unweaned calves
to continental Europe breaches EU
Regulation 1/2005
on the
protection of animals during transport.

The animal welfare
groups previously highlighted breaches of the regulation and are now arguing for
the first time that the trade should not be taking place at all as it entails
“undue suffering” to the animals.

According to the three
groups, calves may be on the truck for five hours before the ferry to France
leaves Ireland. This includes loading time onto the truck, the journey to the
port, and waiting at the port before the truck embarks on the ferry.

In addition, the groups write, calves can go unfed for up to three hours before loading onto the truck. The ferry journey to Cherbourg takes 18 hours, with another 90 minutes required to drive to the lairage near Cherbourg for unloading before all the calves are feed.

Stressful journeys

The letter argues that
calves can go for 24 hours or more without feeding with milk replacer between
the time they are loaded onto transport trucks at the start of the journey and their
first feed at Cherbourg.

The groups argue that
subjecting the unweaned calves to 24 hours without feed would fall under article
three of the regulations that no person shall transport animals or cause
animals to be transported in a way “likely to cause injury or undue suffering
to them”.

The regulations
provide that unweaned calves may only be transported for more than eight hours
if, after nine hours of travel, they are given liquid and “if necessary fed”. “The
above considerations make it clear that unweaned calves that are transported
for around 24 hours without feed are likely to experience undue suffering,” the
letter warns.

Speaking to The Green
News, CIWF’s chief policy advisor Peter Stevenson said that the trade in live exports
caused “undue suffering” to Irish calves.

“Ireland’s trade involves
young calves going for 24 hours or more without feed which results in the
animals being hungry, fatigued and vulnerable to disease.  This trade is
unlawful and inhumane and should be brought to a rapid end,” he added.

Additional EU regulations
covering the welfare of farmed animals states that all calves “shall be fed at
least twice a day”. The groups argue that transported calves would need even
more feed as they use up more energy during transport than they would if kept
in normal farm conditions.

“Young calves do not
have a fully developed immune system. If feeding is stopped or significantly
reduced, this has a considerable impact on the immune system of calves that are
already under severe stress due to being transported,” the letter adds.

The transport is also “inherently
stressful” and has additional impact on the immunity of the calves, the letter
states, with the lack of feeding during transport compounding the stress and
can “further compromise their immune system”.

The Department of Agriculture did not reply to requests for comment from The Green News.  

Commission case

Compassion in World Farming has consistently made complaints to the Department of Agriculture the European Commission about Ireland’s failure to ensure compliance with EU laws since the late 1990s.

In June 2018, CIWF and several animal welfare organisations called on the European Commission to start infringement procedures
against Ireland
 over conditions for calves exported to mainland
Europe.

The groups told the Commission that Ireland is responsible for
“systematically failing to enforce” EU regulations on the protection of animals
during transport since as far back as 1999.

Over the past few
years, several cases of live Irish cattle exports have documented breaches of
EU animal welfare regulations in both the EU and Turkey. In March 2018, for example, Eyes on Animals recorded
footage of a journey from Rosslare to a veal farm in The Netherlands
 in which the rest period was not respected.

The investigation also revealed that there were water access issues for the calves aboard the trucks as the drinking teats were not accessible for the calves. Some of the calves had dirty eyes, diarrhoea and sunken bellies, the group said.

About the Author

Niall Sargent

Niall is the Editor of The Green News. He is a multimedia journalist, with an MA in Investigative Journalism from City University, London

The post Live exports ‘unlawful’, animal rights groups warn Minister appeared first on Green News Ireland.